Mason and Sheehan reunion at the VFW

I received an invitation through one of my Facebook friends for a game of competitive team trivia at the Sheehy-Palmer VFW post. Why not. I figured it would be a fun game and a good time.

Especially when I found out that the host of the event was former PYX 106 morning jock Bob Mason.

If you did not grow up in this area during the 1980’s and 1990’s, Bob Mason and Bill Sheehan were the only morning radio jocks who stood up to Howard Stern when the “King of All Media” syndicated his show to WQBK. Oh there were snipes back and forth, and I think there’s an audio clip on one of Howard Stern’s CD’s of Mason and Sheehan arguing with Stern and Robin Quivers over who had the better ratings in Albany. Let’s face it. The most recognizable Capital District disc jockeys and on-air personalities in the late 1980’s and mid-1990’s were Mason and Sheehan, Don Weeks, Boom Boom Brannigan, David Allan, Todd Pettingill and Sugar Bear. Oh yeah, and Rick Mitchell and Walt Adams. Don’t want to forget those guys.

Anyway, I arrived at the VFW post. The bartender, a guy named Jim, let me know that the VFW hosts “open” events like this to encourage membership, either through veterans or families of veterans. Technically I would qualify as an “auxiliary” member, in that I did have family members who served in the Korean War and in the Vietnam War. I’ll definitely have to think about that.

Some other people showed up, they were ready to play trivia. I found out that the prize for winning trivia was a round of beer, so essentially for me this was just a game for the night, an evening diversion. Bob Mason recognized me – he used to come to the Tuesday night trivia events years ago at Hooters, and he knew of the Street Academy “one man wrecking crew.” We joked for a few moments, and then he started to set up his equipment.

“Oh yeah, this guy’s a tough one for trivia,” said another gentleman, pointing at me. I didn’t recognize him, but apparently he recognized me from all the times when I and Jeremy and Alexis won week after week after week at Revolution Hall. Ah, those were the days…

8:00 and the game is about to start with the traditional raising of the glasses for a social. Unfortunately, we had to wait another ten minutes – Mason lost the questions for the night. Luckily, he had reserve questions available, and eventually he and special guest announcer Bill Sheehan started the game.

And talk about some obscure questions. There were question about the gangster that was born Lester Gillis (Baby-Face Nelson, none of us got it), there was a question about the drummer who replaced Keith Moon in the Who (Kenny Jones, I got that one), there was a question about the capital of Brazil (no it’s not Sao Paulo and it’s not Rio, it’s something called “Brazilia”).

There was a ten-pointer in which we were asked to spell a certain word. No, I’m not printing this word in my blog; if you’ve ever seen that episode of Seinfeld in which he can’t remember the name of his new girlfriend, only that it rhymes with a female body part… You want to see the TU blog filter explode? Me neither. Suffice it to say that almost everybody in the VFW post got it right. And you can read into whatever you like from that statement. ;)

I should mention that everybody at the VFW post had a good time, there were plenty of drinks and dart games and cigars – lots and lots of cigars – in the room. Three-quarters of the way into the game, all the teams chipped in and ordered pizzas for delivery. Nice touch. Dutch Masters and pepperonis.

The final question was “Local Sports.” I had a sizeable lead, and bet conservatively.

“Who did Mike Tyson defeat for his first heavyweight championship?”

Damn. I thought I knew this. Okay, it wasn’t Michael Spinks, he beat Spinks after he unified the belt. Was it Bonecrusher Smith? Damn. Was it Tyrell Biggs? Come on, Chuck, think…

And the only name I could come up with was Pinklon Thomas. I know that Tyson beat the snot out of Pinklon Thomas, at that point in time he was beating the snot out of everybody in the ring. Up went the answer slip.

Well, it wasn’t Pinklon Thomas. And it wasn’t George Foreman or Robin Givens or any of the other answers offered up by the teams. It was the man that Tyson hit once and he fell down three times… Trevor Berbick.

Damn.

But because I bet a safe bet, and since nobody got the answer correct, I won. Nice.

After the game, I chatted with Mason and Sheehan – apparently the radio duo actually saw that fight live in Las Vegas. We talked about how Mike Tyson used to go to Albany Patroons games and then spend the evening at September’s. You know September’s as DiCarlo’s, but that was back in the day when September’s was a nightclub and not a stripclub.

“You hosted a good game, Bob,” I said to Mason as he was putting away the microphone and speaker set.

“Yeah,” he replied, “I wish I could have found the questions I would have used for tonight, instead of going to these backup questions – ”

And as he put away some of the notebooks and sheets of looseleaf paper… “And here are the questions for tonight. Just when the game is over.”

Ha. And where do you find most lost things? Of course, they’re in the last place that you look.

So in the end, it was a great night and a fun time. There wasn’t any major prizes or championships on the line – it was just a relaxed game of trivia at the Sheehy-Palmer Post for the Veterans of Foreign Wars. That, and an impromptu Mason and Sheehan reunion to go with it.

Nice.

Chuck Miller

11 Responses

You go Chuck! Glad you had a good time with the ‘guys’. I used to go to all their parties, especially the Saratoga breakfasts. Good times back when I was a lot younger and could hang out. Glad to here you won, although no big prizes.

Sounds like it was a fun evening. I miss hearing those guys on the radio. The market has changed drastically since they left, and not necessarily for the better. I always especially liked Bill’s news segments. His “kicker” stories were always just a little different and usually very amusing. I will always remember fondly their exploits at “Niagara Falls. . .”